So Much News....

I had lunch yesterday with a couple of sweet friends at the Texan Cafe in Hutto.  

This place is famous for pie. 

You can't go to a place famous for pie and not get pie, right?  I had chocolate fudge.  It was delicious.  I tried not to eat much of the crust, but it is pie so I was not completely successful!

Guess what?  By yesterday evening, the rash behind my ear was back and my right forearm was getting itchy.  The gluten rash is a real condition and apparently I have it. I will get back to strict gluten free diet and assume my rashy, itchy skin will get with the program.  

Outside of the gluten test, the lunch company was absolutely delightful and we vowed to do it again soon.

In other random news:

• I watched college football yesterday evening and plan to do a whole lot more of that over the weekend! YAY!! 
• Intermittent fasting is going well.  16 hours is long.  8 hours is short.  I feel desperate at the end of both. I made Harry some Clam Chowder last night during fasting hours and I may have had a couple tastes of the soup.  I felt a tiny bit of fasting remorse, but you can't cook without tasting!  Just ask Bobby Flay! 
• Me and my sturdy steed Cooper got in three good long walks this week with Martha!  We are both a little stiff and sore from our outings, but starting to feel a little bit closer to normal. 
• Last night, Harry covered his last home game with the Express for this baseball season.  The team is ending the season on the road so he will have a few more nights covering the games from home.  Then he hangs around for some events at the Dell Diamond, but not covering the baseball season.  It has been such a great learning experience for him! 
• Chip is doing good - not much to report.  He is keeping up with his homework like a champ, without much input from me... THANK GOODNESS!  

Late breaking, more serious news:

• Thanks to all of you who have checked on Lana's biopsy.  News isn't great.  More to come in the days ahead, but I would sure appreciate you keeping my mom in your prayers. 
• I talked with Bob a bit yesterday and he passed his stress test with flying colors, but went to the eye doctor the same afternoon and has cataracts in both eyes that need to be addressed.  He is seeing an eye surgeon next week. Pray for him too.

Basically, if you could just cover my parents in prayer and send all your good mojo their way I would be so grateful.  

Have a great weekend and if you drive by my house I hope you can hear me yelling ROLL TIDE from my couch! 

Fasting is Fun!

I just finished Day Two of intermittent fasting and thought I would share some of the texts I have been sending to my brother and sister.  I am not dramatic at all.  I do not know how they stand me.

100th Post of 2018

My sweet friend Liz sent me an encouraging message yesterday and also pointed out that I was at 99 posts for 2018 and my next one would be my 100th!  That feels like a milestone worthy of acknowledging!  Let's jot down the top 100 things that pop into my head!

Just kidding, let's do ten.

1.  I received so many heartfelt messages in response to my last Bittersweet post.  People are so good.  I love that I can share my heart with you and you guys share yours right back with me.  We can do hard things.  Sure is nice that we don't have to do them alone.

2. I started intermittent fasting on a whim yesterday just because my brother mentioned he was trying it.  Eat only in an eight hour window and then fast for 16 hours.  I LOVED the eight hour eating window.  Complete breeze.  The 16 hour fasting window however is proving to be very LONG.  I have three hours left before I can eat today and I check my count down clock every forty seconds to see how much time I have left.

3.  I have started repairs on the boys shower, gluing back on the soap dish that Chip ripped right off the wall.  It looks like a totally professional job. Am, I right?  I have to caulk around the dish and can then clean the tub within an inch of its life.  Nothing like some terrible photography to make you want to spray, scrub, rinse and repeat all over a bathtub!

4.  Got two walks in this week with Martha. Early morning talks and walks under the cover of darkness are one of my very favorite things.  I have missed it and am thrilled to be easing back into a routine.  About three miles....leg feels great!  Cooper is also very happy.

5. Chip had a migraine Monday night.  He has not had one of those in a very long time.  It was not fun.  It involved severe pain and vomiting.  The worst.

6. Lana's biopsy scheduled for last week was postponed until yesterday.  It went off without a hitch and she should have results pretty quickly.  Prayers continue to be appreciated.

7.  I am making pork chops in the crock pot for dinner tonight.  Crock pot cooking is so easy...why don't I do it more often?

8.  Speaking of cooking, this weekend I tried soft boiled eggs for the first time in my life.  They were fantastic, even served on a gluten free English muffin.  I was inspired by a post I saw from Jen Hatmaker, who is hilarious in all things but apparently a genius in the soft boiled egg department.

9.  We are hosting a pancake breakfast at my house in a couple weeks for our Love Box family.  I am going to get my Grandma Box out of the garage and let the little ones play with the boys old Thomas the Train set.  Going to drag out all the wooden puzzles I saved.  So much fun.  I CANNOT WAIT!!!    

10.  Good news....only 2:51:40 left until I can eat again!  

This blog, in its very short life has been an absolute treasure to me.  Happy 100th post to me!  

Have a spectacular Wednesday!  May you have lots of things to smile about and try to laugh hard at least once! 

Bittersweet

Tonight, about 8:30 I took TWDITW for a walk to the mailbox to pick up the mail.  It was hot and muggy and dark, but the moon was bright and the bats were flying overhead.  Sprinklers were going off along our path and we were just moseying along while Coop smelled all the things. It was peaceful and unhurried.

As we got closer to the mailboxes, I could hear splashing and laughing coming from the neighborhood pool. The nostalgia hit me like a ton of bricks. I couldn't help but go a little bit closer.  Kids were laughing and screaming "Not it!" and jumping into the water.  Not sure if it was a game of sharks and minnows or some other pool competition, but they were living their very best life on this hot Friday night after the first long week of school. That was my life not so many years ago, but tonight it made my chest feel tight and my eyes sting with tears.  I am not sure what all the emotion was about, but I am sure it was partly the sweet, precious memories of "night swims" at the pool and my darling children as rambunctious little boys...along with the overwhelming sadness of my personal story contaminated by this damn divorce.  My memories are all jaded and messy. I was sad.  But also, I realized when I was in living those moments I knew they were good.  I was not a mom who sat on the edge.  I was a mom who got in an played and made up games and made those kids play fair.  I lived those moments and they are mine.

As I made my way home, I smiled as I dug up memories of so many nights heading home all wrapped up in towels, smelling like chlorine, stripping out of bathing suits in the garage, wet towels everywhere, children always starving after a night swim.  The best.

Sweet, precious memories that kind of hurt.  Maybe they hurt for everyone.

Bittersweet.

I know you never know what you are going to get when you open up this blog, but tonight I am grateful that I have somewhere to share my feelings.  It helps.

RECIPE ALERT - Roasted Tomatoes

Last night, I roasted cherry tomatoes in the oven and then my taste buds died of joy!  

Where have these been my whole life?  

I follow a couple of accounts online that have been discussing various ways to enjoy tomatoes during the bounty of summer.  Roasting had come up a time or two and lingered on my radar.  I had a container of cherry tomatoes that needed to be used and thought I would give roasting a try.  Here is how easy it was...pour the container of tomatoes out onto a parchment paper lined cookie sheet, leave the tomatoes whole, drizzle with some olive oil and sprinkle with salt.  I dug in and used my hands to make sure each tomato was coated with oil and salt, because I like cooking with my hands and I didn't want any tomato to feel left out.  Pop them into a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes or so.  Wait for the delicious goodness that is this blackened bottom to happen.  

LET IT HAPPEN - do not panic! 

Then eat.  Eat them all.  That is what I did.  I ate them ALL and could have eaten at least three more containers with no problem and no remorse.    

After I ate about ten of the tomatoes straight off the cookie sheet, I a few took pictures and texted some friends to proclaim their goodness. I poured the rest of them on top of a bed of greens and gobbled them up along with this delicious gluten free pasta dish.  The pasta dish was just thrown together with whatever I was pulling out of my fridge.  I sauteed a whole onion along with some sweet peppers until they were caramelized, then tossed in the cooked pasta with a some butter and garlic and a bit of salt and red pepper flakes.  Then I sat down and ate dinner with a huge smile on my face.  It was really good!  

I love most all tomatoes, but these roasted tomatoes were just some kind of magical. Really. I almost think I enjoyed them more right off the cookie sheet!  Like, I would make these to eat as a snack to eat watching a football game.  In fact, I think I will do exactly that!  Now, if you are not a tomato fan (Hey, Beth!) then you probably won't enjoy this version, but everyone else....MAKE THEM TONIGHT!

P.S.  If you were wondering....no my boys did not eat this. I made meatball and cheese stuffed jumbo shells for them.  From all accounts, it was also tasty.  

Gluten Rash

Hello all.  Life is rocking along with no big events to report, but here are few interesting tidbits for you...

• I went to dinner with some friends last Wednesday and while standing in line to order I was lamenting about the stupid rash on my arm.  Within ten seconds, my friend Diane (a nurse) said "Are you gluten intolerant?" She pulled up a picture of a gluten rash and it looked exactly like mine and the rash symptoms were exactly what I was experiencing.  So, standing in line at an Italian restaurant, Diane recommended I go gluten free for six weeks just to see.  I ordered gluten free pasta, that was delicious and have been gluten free ever since.  Results seem to be pretty remarkable.  The rash on my forearms no long itches, although the scarring may take some time to heal. I have had a rash behind my left ear for about two years.  It flares up when I am stressed or worried.  It is gone. In fact, it was gone after three days of gluten free eating.  What in the world?  Gonna stick with it and see what other remarkable differences I can see from eating gluten free.  I will keep you posted. 

• I puttered around the house all weekend cleaning and cooking and I was just so happy.  I cooked some things for a meal we delivered to our Love Box family and dirtied every dish in my house three times.  Even made homemade rolls with gluten for them.  House smelled amazing!  Playing a little music, vacuuming, dusting, laundry, slicing, chopping, sauteing, kneading....great smells....ahh, I just love it. 

• I am walking pretty normal, although I have to be kind of purposeful with my stride to make sure I am not favoring my bad leg.  That has caused some aching in my left hip, but that is starting to ease up.  

So, basically this is a blog about a broken girl, with a healing forearm rash who dances around her kitchen trying not to drag her bad leg.  Pretty riveting stuff. 

In other news:

• IT'S ALMOST COLLEGE FOOTBALL SEASON!!!   CANNOT WAIT!!! 
• Chip is back to school and it is going well.  He has an off period, so he gets out at 2:30 on A Day.  That makes him such a happy camper. 
• Harry has a long ten day home stand with his baseball team to wrap up the season!  What a great experience he has had. 

Finally, I have some prayer requests for you:

• Wednesday, my sweet friend Lori is having surgery on her broken Tibia.  Pray for successful surgery and quick healing. 
• Thursday, my momma is having a biopsy done.  Pray for calm nerves, great test results and no further concern or treatment. 
• That sweet little Rylie that lives in our neighborhood is starting her freshman year at Baylor and had a bad lymph node show up in her last cancer scans.  Pray that it is localized, can be removed and that darling girl can get on with living her best life! 

Have a fantastic week and shine your light bright!  Be the kindness in the world.  

The Rest of the Story

You know that super suspenseful cliff hanger I left you with yesterday?  Here is the rest of the story....

Friday afternoon, when I walked out of the Orthopedic office with no crutches I was so happy!  I sent a text to my family and some of my girls celebrating my good news!  There was definitely a Woo Hoo in my text!

About an hour later, I received a response from my friend Lori (Tibi's mom!) that had the appropriate amount of YEAH!  Hallelujah! that I would expect in response to my great news!  We had been regulars at the dog park together for well over a year and my injured leg had really put a damper on things.  She had dutifully checked in on me, left sweet little prizes on my doorstep and we were both more than ready to get back to our regular visits!

Except....

Her text also included a picture of her swollen left knee and it said "You won't believe what happened about 30 minutes ago.  I was playing ball with Tibi in the back yard and she crashed into me and I had some incredible pain in my leg.  I am icing it now, taking some Tylenol and waiting."

Lori lives right around the corner from me, so I hopped in my car to deliver my crutches and knee brace in hopes that they would help her be a little more mobile while she surveyed the damage to her knee.

SIDE NOTE:  I got to meet her ADORABLE grandchildren (along with her son and daughter-in-law, who were also darling, but it might be a little much to call them ADORABLE) while I was dropping off the knee gear.  ADORABLE is in all caps, because Holy Guacamole they were just precious.  Why do I want to put all the little children in my purse and bring them home with me?

Lori was icing her knee and planning to to give it until morning to make her next move. If it wasn't a bit better in the morning, she would go to the ER to get some X-rays. I assume pain progressed over the course of the afternoon, because a few hours later, I got a message that said "Does this look familiar?" along with this photo:

Y'all....her Tibia is fractured...SAME LEG, SAME BONE, SAME LOCATION!  What in the world kind of horrible coincidence is this?  My fracture was intact, which I think means the bones were still together and with hers there is definitely a gap between the bones, so I think her break is much worse.  Of course, my left leg immediately started aching in sympathy and remembrance.  UGH!  It hurts so bad and I am so freshly removed from it that I could have just thrown up.

Instead of throwing up, I immediately started in with selfish rants like "Quit copying me!" and "We are NEVER going to get to go back to the dog park!"  She assured me that copying me was not her intention and that my waterfall story was way better than getting mowed over by a rambunctious chocolate lab. We got a chuckle out of it, but it really isn't funny at all.  It is awful.

So, please join me in praying for my sweet friend. She will be dealing with this injury in the days and weeks to come and will need every bit of God's healing comfort to get through it.  

A Little More Detail

Happy Saturday!  I know I dumped a lot on you guys with that last top ten, so let me go back and revisit one of the big ones that I got several texts about.

Chip quitting football.  I wasn't expecting it, but I wasn't surprised. He didn't really love football last year and talked about maybe not playing at the end of last season. But then they went into conditioning and his new epilepsy diagnosis and we didn't address it again. This summer he had many, many mornings where the 6:30 alarm went off for conditioning camp and he really didn't feel like he had rested well. Seems to be a problem for some people with epilepsy. Sleep is the most important thing you can do for your brain - but you just can't sleep well.  That has been Chip's story for years.  He just doesn't sleep well very often.  He is doing better on the prescriptions he is taking now, but still needs about nine hours or so to feel rested.  I think that probably has something to do with being a growing boy/man too.  Teenagers just require a lot of sleep.  With full on football practice coming at him soon, he really started to think he didn't want to play.  He just wasn't looking forward to it as he had in years past.  I also think the early bedtime and early wake up time for the upcoming season was a consideration.  Was it worth going to bed at 8:30 for a 5:30 a.m. wake up call?  He was really worried, thinking he would be a disappointment to his family or he would get some push back which is why it took him so long to say something.

My thoughts and feelings on the subject....and I recognize they probably should be sprinkled with a lot more...you can do hard things....life isn't supposed to be easy....sometimes you have to do things you don't love in life, but I really just can't get too fired up about applying those to this situation.  There ARE definitely lots of hard things in life and you will have to walk through them, but dude, it's high school football. It is supposed to be fun. If you don't love it, then don't play.  There is not one thing about high school that will define who you are as an adult person.  High school is a blip on the map of your life. You just survive it, you hopefully learn some study skills, some time management, how to get along with all kinds of people, cope with your hormones, acne, figure out girls.  It can be some tough years, so you should really have as much fun as you can in these fleeting young years of your life. None of high school comes with you. Clean slate when you start college and you get to keep writing your own story every day after that.  So, he had to go talk to his coach and that was hard. We had to get his schedule changed and that was only a little bit hard. I think now that he has made the decision, had the hard conversations with his parents and his coach, he is feeling relieved and actually looking forward to the new school year. So, bless up Chip!

Now a few other updates:

Dermatologist thinks my rash is some kind of contact rash...prescription steroid cream is on board, being applied and working (although slowly!) and it was only $5.00.  Grateful for that!

Gorilla Glue will hopefully fix the soap holder in the boys shower.

Juice cleanse is underway. I did have some cantaloupe and a few crackers with peanut butter yesterday, because I had a raging headache and thought some food might help.  It did.  I hope that doesn't nullify all the juice cleanse benefits, but drinking five bottles of juice and sending all those micro nutrients right into my bloodstream have got to be good news for my body, right?  Also, I have been a frequent visitor to the restroom.  A little annoying, but I feel really good this morning!

My knee!  I had an appointment yesterday afternoon and have been released from crutches and am gradually able to start getting back to regular activity. Start slow and gradually increase activity as I feel I can. I am so happy.  But, y'all will NOT believe what happened yesterday afternoon. I can't hardly believe it.

I am going to leave that right here as kind of a cliff hanger....

I have to get ready to go do some volunteer work with no crutches....HOORAY....but come back, because later this afternoon I am going to have a story for you!

Top Ten Highlights

Top Ten highlights from the last few days (you should expect further details in a future blog posts about any/or all of the subjects below):

1. Chip hung up his cleats and is not playing football next year.
2. I stopped using crutches.
3. Harry almost burned up the vacuum.
4. I still have the arm rash - appointment at Dermatologist this week. 
5. Chip accidentally ripped the soap dish off the tile wall in the shower.
6. I had a birthday.
7. Harry took a picture at work that was published in the local newspaper.
8. Chip helped me repair a broken sprinkler head in the yard.
9. I am going to do a juice cleanse to reset and kick start some healthy eating.
10. Cooper is still alive and filling our house with drama. 

Hope Monday is treating you well!

Cicada

Y'all, I have a true story to tell.  Even when it was happening I was thinking...this is definitely going to make the blog!

Tuesday night, me and Chip headed upstairs to bed about 11:00 pm and left Harry at the kitchen table eating some late night leftovers as he is inclined to do.  I got all tucked in and was playing a few games of Words with Friends as I am inclined to do.

All of the sudden, I hear Harry barreling up the stairs and he busts through my bedroom door and says "Mom, someone is knocking on the back door!"  I said "Who?"  He said "I DON'T KNOW - I DIDN'T LOOK, I JUST BOLTED UPSTAIRS!"

Well, what is there to do, but get up and go see who is at the backdoor?  I assume if it is a bad guy they wouldn't be knocking.  So, I head downstairs with my two six foot boys behind me.  I don't see or hear anything at the back door so I turn on the patio light. I still don't see anything.  I open the door to peek my head out and I'll be damned if a giant cicada doesn't buzz by my legs, fly into the kitchen and start doing that loud spinning thing on the kitchen floor.  All three of us go berserk - running, screaming, jumping, whatever else you do when a cicada is in your house!  It dawns on Harry that it wasn't a knock, but a giant bug running into the glass.  UGH!

We finally gather our wits about us and start creeping around looking for the cicada.  We creep into the kitchen, looking under cabinets, on top of cabinets, behind things, under things.  Nothing. Finally, we get a little braver and start making a little more noise to see if we can stir it up and figure out where it is.  Not sure what we hit, but stirs it up and that loud sound returns and it runs us all out of the kitchen again.

Oh brother.  Now what?  How are we going to get it out of the house?

Harry suggests burning the house to the ground. He is not a fan of any bug, much less this giant, loud one.

Chip says there is no way he can sleep in the house with that thing on the loose.  He gets brave and starts really looking hard for it.

Harry and I are waiting in the den for either screams of victory from Chip for locating the cicada or screams of terror that the cicada has landed on his back.  While we wait Harry says to me "I think I would rather a deranged lunatic that escaped from an insane asylum have come through that door with an axe in his hand instead of that bug."  His fear of the bugs is real.

Chip looks high and low for nearly an hour and there is no cicada anywhere.  I convince them both to go to bed and assure them the bug will not fly upstairs while they sleep. They reluctantly agree - but probably slept with one eye open and towels crammed in the crack under their door.

Come morning, the first thing I think of as I am heading down the stairs is "Wonder how long it is going to take to find that bug?"  It did not take long!

I was making my coffee and putting some dishes into the dishwasher, when I moved a pan in the sink and spotted the cicada in the sink on mesh strainer.  I freaked out because a) I was so close to it b) it was huge.  I was so afraid it was going to start flying and making that awful racket and I was going to have beat myself to death if it got in my hair!

I screamed for reinforcements to come downstairs and with Chip's help, I managed to cover it with a Tupperware bowl, lift up the strainer to trap him and throw the whole shooting match out in the backyard.  The cicada took off flying as soon as the strainer and Tupperware separated in the air and he was over the fence before they hit the grass.  Whew!

What a fiasco!  There has been a lot of screaming over here in the last few days.  Wonder if the neighbors are starting to wonder what the heck kind of operation we are running?

Lesson learned - DO NOT open the door when a cicada comes knocking!  They are terrible house guests.